Eminent domain’s poster children

Ranchers fight a military proposal to expand training ground in southeastern Colorado

People in southeastern Colorado are mad at the military.
But the resisters aren't long-haired peaceniks, they are mostly
ranchers whose land happens to lie in the path of a proposed
half-million-acre expansion of the Pinon Canyon Maneuver
Site

ERYN GABLE

Kennie and Maria Gyurman

ERYN GABLE

Tim and Annette Roberts

ERYN GABLE

Tony Hass

ERYN GABLE

Mack Louden

ERYN GABLE

Abel and Judy Benavidez

ERYN GABLE

The Army says it will acquire land only from willing
sellers, but that could be a challenge, as this sign and map
demonstrate. The red parcels on the map are owned by people
unwilling to sell as of last fall. Since then, even more landowners
have said they're unwilling to sell

Antelope peer out from behind a cluster of wild
sunflowers growing along the dusty dirt roads of southeastern
Colorado, a place where you can still find wagon ruts left over
from travelers on the Old Santa Fe Trail. On the walls of redrock
canyons there are centuries-old petroglyphs.

If the
military has its way, a half-million acres of this land may become
a training ground for combat in the Middle East. The Army has set
its sights on expanding its 235,000-acre Pinon Canyon Maneuver Site
by more than 400,000 acres, a move it says is necessary to
"accurately simulate anticipated, actual, combat conditions."
Although Army officials have said they want to purchase the
additional land from "willing sellers," ranchers in the area
believe the military will use eminent domain to take their land.
The Army has done it before, when the training facility was first
established in the 1980s.

Expansion opponents have won
some significant victories so far, with both the U.S. House and
Senate adopting amendments to their military funding bills that
would prohibit funding for the expansion and related studies next
year. But no one knows whether that provision will remain intact in
the final spending bill, especially since it was opposed in the
Senate by Colorado Sen. Wayne Allard, R, who will sit on the
conference committee responsible for writing the final legislation.
Even if the amendment survives, it is likely to prove just a
skirmish in what promises to be a long battle.

These
ranchers are on the front line of this fight, and they say that not
only is their land at stake, but also their way of life.

When Kennie and Maria Gyurman decided to retire,
fighting the military-industrial complex wasn't exactly what they
had in mind. They expected to raise a few head of cattle on the 148
acres they bought from Kennie's brother, do a little gardening and
maybe a little traveling.

But no sooner had they put the
finishing touches on their custom-built brick ranch house than they
began to hear rumors of the expansion effort. It was a scene that
was all too familiar to Kennie, whose family lost more than 5,000
acres of their nearly 17,000-acre ranch in the 1980s. He still gets
choked up talking about it. "They treat you like dirt," he says.
"They're treating the people like dirt right now."

He
says the locals have wised up to the way the military operates,
however, and are better organized to fight a land grab. "It's
different this time because we know what to expect," he says.

"They do know how to do what they're doing, and that's
quietly, as fast as possible, make it as tough on the people as
they can so that they will ... spread the word that you don't want
to oppose the Army when they get ready to condemn because it isn't
worth it," Gyurman says. "People have heart attacks, they pay them
less for their land, they don't ever give them any information,
they just pick them off. That's the way it happens."

Tim and Annette Roberts didn't even get to go on
a honeymoon. The couple, married just over a year, have been so
embroiled in fighting the expansion and keeping their ranch afloat
that they haven't had time for much else. Tim is still trying to
rebuild the 20,000-acre ranch after drought forced him to sell all
the cattle but a few longhorns in 2002. To help make ends meet, he
works for a coalbed methane company, Pioneer Natural Resources in
Trinidad. "We haven't taken a day off," Roberts says.

For
Roberts, who hopes to hand the ranch over to his son someday,
keeping the land in the family is partly about fulfilling a promise
he made as a young child to his cousins. "Even when we were real
little, I can remember all of us talking and saying that no matter
what, we had to keep the ranches together. Regardless of what
happened, that was like our main goal from the time we was real
young. We had to keep the ranches together."

Tony Hass didn't grow up on a ranch. He grew up
in the military, with a career-Navy father who made his children
bounce quarters off their beds to make sure the sheets were tucked
in tight enough. But he was entranced by the stories his
grandfather told about homesteading land in southeastern Colorado.
After a few years of amateur bullriding and working on other
ranches, Hass decided to make his long-held dream a reality. He
bought property in Thatcher, just 15 miles from where his
grandfather once lived.

"I didn't inherit this ranch,"
Hass says. "I had to work every job that I could find to make this
work. I mean, I've drove a dozer, I've pushed a broom for the
school as a night janitor, I've dug sewers, I've hauled hay, I've
done fence construction, all of that, to make payments on this
place, to make sure that we made it through the hard times. ... It
isn't happening anymore that a young couple, a young man can start
from scratch and put a ranch together, and I've managed to do it,
and I'm within two years of paying the place off."

Hass'
5,800-acre ranch is anchored by an 1872 adobe home and includes the
Hole in the Rock stage stop, portions of the Santa Fe Trail and
ancient pictographs. He has a collection of old arrowheads and rare
coins he suspects were used in poker games by the first cowboys to
live in the area. Now, Hass worries that all this history will be
lost forever if the Army takes his land.

Mack
Louden's ranch isn't in jeopardy yet, but that doesn't
mean he isn't worried. Louden and many of the ranchers in the area
believe the current expansion effort is just the first phase of a
long-term plan by the military to take over most of southern
Colorado, some 2.5 million acres in all, according to an Army map
leaked to the opposition. Although the Army has dismissed the map
as outdated and inaccurate, many ranchers remain unconvinced.

Louden's family first came to the area from Ohio in 1902,
making him the fourth generation to live and work in the region.
Besides his 22,000-acre ranch east of Branson, Mack and his wife,
Toyleen, run Marty Feeds in Trinidad. If the expansion effort
succeeds, Louden worries that the feed store will falter, the
demand for livestock feed and other ranching supplies dwindling
with the exodus of the ranchers.

Louden noted that the
region's economy still hasn't recovered from the loss of the
original 235,000 acres. "People realize now that as precarious as
this economy is in southeastern Colorado, we take another 414,000
acres out of here, it's gonna start hurting a lot of cities," he
says. "It's gonna hurt everybody, and I think that people are
realizing that."

Abel Benavidez's
ancestors moved to southeastern Colorado in 1872,
settling first in Red Rocks before moving to the family's current
plot of land in 1925. Benavidez moved back to the 800-acre ranch in
1996, after he retired from the Bureau of Reclamation. While the
ranch is small by southeastern Colorado standards, Benavidez says
it's good land, blessed with a pretty good aquifer, clean air and
views of the mountains.

Abel and Judy, his wife of 23
years, are doing everything they can to stop the expansion. These
days, that means attending endless meetings - with other members of
the opposition coalition, the Colorado Cattlemen's Association, the
Kiwanis Club and other groups - as well as dealing with a steady of
flood of e-mails and telephone calls, keeping a close eye on
important congressional votes via C-SPAN, and activities such as
manning the coalition's booth at the state fair. "It just keeps
things in a constant turmoil, and I really believe that this is
what the Army would like to do," says Abel, who served in the
military for more than 30 years. "They're gonna use taxpayers'
dollars to fight us and then what they're gonna say is, 'We'll tire
you guys out. We'll tire you guys out.' Really, honest to God. And
they may do that."

But Benavidez is determined to stay as
long as he can: "I'm going to be the poster child for eminent
domain, because they're going to have to carry me off of this
place, and that's the God's truth."

More from Military

The National Guard of Wyoming often hosts the U.S.
Army and Allied troops at the recently greatly expanded
similar facility at
Guernsey,Wyoming.
Some ranchers sold willingly; some not. The new commander
immediately ordered tank trails everywhere and a live fire exercise
with tracers and exploding shells that burned 40,000 acres in this
area of 12 years drought. And two visiting U.K.
troops held down a local girl and raped
her.
But our politicians waved the flag and called it 'Economic
Development'!'

Anonymous

Oct 15, 2007 12:42 PM

I travel to Southeastern Colorado regularly
for work and I am very familiar with the people who live and work
there.

These ranchers are ALL
Republicans. They all voted for Dubya twice and now
they're whining because Dubya wants to take their land.

They brought this down upon themselves by
voting Republican. I have little sympathy for them.

msharpe37

Oct 21, 2007 10:04 PM

Well i'm sure that Dubya
wasn't raising this issue when he was up for election now
was he, come on man, i hate to be the guy that starts stuff with
writers but all i'm asking you to do is think about it, the
army and Dubya on one side, the citizens (so-called Republicans) on
the other. The people who LIVE in southeast Colorado definately
weren't expecting this! I think we should fight to stop
this expansion of military. If it is to be a training grounds for
middle east combat than it also suggests we won't be
pulling out of Iraq soon either will it?

Anonymous

Oct 22, 2007 01:57 PM

Thank you so much for publishing this article in
you're magazine. I hope it serves as a way to inform people
about the issue we are facing in SE Colorado. This proposed land
grab stands to ruin not only lives but the beautiful landscape and
history of this area. We are working together as a group to get
this stopped and hope that by publishing this letter more and more
people will get involved. We are fighting for not only our
existance but the future of our children wanting to return to the
land their family has worked for many years. Any method used for
spreading the would be greatfully appreciated. Thank you so
much..Jean Ballard Box 144 Kim CO 81049
719-643-5200 jeaniek144@rural-com.com

Anonymous

Mar 12, 2008 06:52 PM

In all fairness, any potical party could
overextend its powers by using eminent domain, not only this
administration. Indeed, it is an ironic consequence for
these landowners. However, the focus should be on
promoting the rights of citizens, not bullying them because of
their voting record. If we are to make progress in this
country away from corporatism, them we must find issues to unite
citizens instead of driving them apart.